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DispatchBecky Cason was the first recipient of a lung transplant at Wexner Medical Center since 2009. OSU hopes to perform at least 10 transplants a year, the threshold for Medicare coverage.

Four years after shutting down its faltering lung-transplant program, Ohio State University’s
Wexner Medical Center once again is offering transplants to those with life-threatening lung
disease.

The first transplant took place on Aug. 9, when surgeons replaced Becky Cason’s right lung with
a donor’s.

The Springfield resident, who has severe emphysema, said last week that she was grateful for the
level of care she received in Columbus and for the hospital’s proximity to her home.

Before Ohio State’s program resumed, she likely would have been looking at an operation and
weeks of recovery in Cleveland. Cleveland Clinic surgeons are the only others in the state who
perform lung transplants.

Cason, 55, was walking the halls of the Ross Heart Hospital last week and enjoying a lifting of
the fatigue and shortness of breath that had slowed her for 15 years and become debilitating in the
past seven months.

She was dependent on oxygen and so sick she could not climb the three flights of stairs to
attend her niece’s baby shower, said Cason, who quit smoking when she learned she had
emphysema.

“I was a pretty sick puppy,” she said. “My first walk up steps is going to be
it for me. That was a definite no-no.”

In 2009, Ohio State leaders halted the program because so few patients were undergoing
transplants. The numbers — three in 18 months — were well below the threshold set by the Centers
for Medicare and Medicaid Services.Medicare requires that a program perform 10 transplants a year
for two years with 80 percent survival before it will begin to reimburse.

Patient volume is viewed as a mark of proficiency for a lung-transplant team. If a team gets
together for an operation only every few months, it’s more difficult to maintain a strong,
successful unit.

In 2010, Ohio State hired Dr. Robert Higgins, former president of the United Network for Organ
Sharing, to direct the transplant center. One of his charges was to rebuild the lagging lung
program.

Higgins has since brought in two transplant surgeons, Dr. Bryan Whitson and Dr. Ahmet Kilic.
Pulmonologist Dr. Amy Pope-Harman also is on the team and will soon be joined by another recruit,
Higgins said.

Ohio State applied to UNOS last fall for reinstatement of the lung program. It currently has
about five patients on its waiting list, and Higgins said he hopes the team will perform 10 or more
transplants per year.

Until Ohio State builds its program and gains Medicare approval, the Medical Center will cover
the cost of performing transplants on patients with government insurance.

The hospital is working with private insurers to get coverage for other patients, Higgins
said.The cost of lung transplants in the United States, including related care, runs about $500,000
to $800,000, according to industry data from 2011.

Higgins said the absence of a program here was trying for central Ohio patients facing a drive
to Cleveland or to hospitals in Indiana or Pennsylvania for a transplant and the care that comes
before and after the operation.

“These people need to be close to their family, their support system,” Higgins said.

Last year, the Cleveland Clinic — one of the nation’s leaders — performed 100 lung transplants,
according to the national Organ Procurement and Transplantation Network.

Depending upon the case, surgeons might transplant a single lung or both lungs. In adults, COPD
(chronic obstructive pulmonary disease) is the most common reason for a transplant.